Penelope Cruz is in no hurry to become the next Mrs. Tom Cruise. The two played lovers in Vanilla Sky and have since gone public with their dating. (She was just snapped in L.A. boarding his private plane with his two children.) But the sultry Spanish star is taking things slowly.
"I am not scared of being alone. I think I was for many, many years. I have had very long relationships. ... I am a serial monogamist!" she says in the September issue of Vanity Fair.
Cruise, whose divorce from Nicole Kidman is due to become final tomorrow, may be interested to know that Cruz is skittish about marriage - having seen her parents split this year.
"Getting married would scare me," she tells interviewer Kevin Sessums. "That is always a scary thing when you really open your heart to someone. But I think it is worth it, that fear."
She wouldn't have "a problem" having children out of wedlock, but says, "I haven't decided yet."
Cruz certainly does throw herself into her roles. Shooting Captain Corelli's Mandolin in Greece, she burned a half-moon scar into her arm with an iron to remember the beauty of the place.
Hard-driving reporter
The New York Post's "Lizziemobile" contest has taken yet another bad-taste twist.
Twice now the paper has featured reporter Farrah Weinstein test-driving its prize, a $65,000 Mercedes-Benz SUV - like the one piloted by PR princess Lizzie Grubman the night she ran into 16 people outside a Southampton, N.Y., nightclub. Weinstein admitted in her story that she was qualified to test the vehicle because of her "near-death driving experiences." Turns out she wasn't exaggerating.
Court records show that in 1996 Weinstein was involved in a Manhattan auto crash that left one of her passengers seriously injured and resulted in a $1.75 million legal settlement being paid to the 19-year-old victim, who suffered a brain injury. In court, the Post reporter denied responsibility for the accident, claiming the victim's injuries were "caused wholly or in part" by her failure to wear a seat belt.
Thesmokinggun.com, which posts the court papers on its Web site, rightly asks if, "considering her own checkered driving history," Lizzie-mocking Weinstein "might have been more circumspect when it came to trading on the Grubman accident."
Weinstein didn't return a call. But a Post spokesman maintains, "We think Farrah was an appropriate choice to do these stories."
Party of two
Mick Jagger and Liz Hurley have found each other. The lusty Brits have recently shared two long lunches at Ammo in Hollywood, the L.A. Times' Ann O'Neil reports. Though Hurley was recently snapped smooching actor Mark Reynolds in the Hamptons, we're sure she'll be a great comfort to the Rolling Stone now that he's said to have split with model Sophie Dahl.
Word is the incredible shrinking Miss Dahl has moved onto someone her own age, James Gooding, 25-year-old ex-boyfriend of singer Kylie Minogue.
Carey uncast?
Chris Tucker, riding high on his hit Rush Hour 2, says he's changed his mind about casting sick songbird Mariah Carey in his comedy 00-Soul.
Even before learning of her recent nervous breakdown, Tucker told the Chicago Sun-Times, "I'm not sure if Mariah will be in it. I think we're casting someone else."
A spokeswoman for Carey argues that the 00-Soul project "died a couple of years ago. It never got off the ground."
